"When I saw the worldly beauty of Singapore, that pearl of the Orient, that meeting of the sophistications of East and West, which heightens its lure by reining in, through remnants of old-world frugality, the gaudy permissiveness that ruined the face of the West, only to better compete for the wealth of this world, its streets an orderly, proud, young urban architecture of cellphone-absorbed, fashion-refined, self-policed, polyglot-jaded male and female cadres of dunyâ dressed and bared in the latest fashions...

"... I remembered the sight of decorum, true power and wealth, a few months back, of the Yemeni grandson of the Prophet, upon him and his House blessings and peace, al-Habîb `Alî al-Jafrî, as he walked into a packed auditorium at Dâr al-Fatwâ in Beirut, white jubba and turban over white robe, his gait vigorous but not rushed, his eyes fixed on the same invisible love as his heart, impervious and serene to seeing or being seen as if he were completely alone, yet smiling and present to those around him with the highest courtesy, and the words that followed: 'Let not the would-be summoner to Allâh and His Prophet turn to everything he sees or hears lest his water become colored; then he will become affected by everything and everyone, but affect nothing and no-one!'"

A rare brief Sufi travelogue originally published in Damascus and describing the author's first meeting with several holy figures of Singapore and Johore (Malaysia) such as al-Sayyid al-Sharif Shaykh `Abd al-Maqsud Faris al-Hasani al-Azhari (1933-2011) and al-Habib `Ali b. Jaafar al-`Aydarus (d. 2010), and some of their teachings and poetry, in the tradition of our teacher's explanation of the Majestic Quranic Verse {Whereupon they found one of our slaves whom We had given mercy from Our presence, and whom We had taught, from Our side, a certain knowledge} (Surat al-Kahf 17:65): "Note well how Divine Mercy comes first, and then it opens wide the door to the granting of special knowledge" (Mawlana Shaykh Hisham Kabbani).